Carry On
by Loki Mischeif-Maker
Summary: It's a little while after the first war after it ended for thirteen years with one final shower of grief. Ted and Andromeda Tonks are taking things one day at a time, carrying through the mess it left lives in.


**Disclaimer:** If you recognize it, it's JK Rowling's, not mine. I'm only borrowing the characters for a few moments.

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"Daddy?"

Ted Tonks looked down at his daughter, who was staring up at him out of grey eyes that were almost perfect matches of her mother. Those were the eyes she was born with, not something she'd changed to because she wanted to look different. Her hair, on the other hand, was naturally chestnut. Nymphadora, however, had managed to change it into a very bright shade of blue. "Yes, honey?"

She shoved the book in her hands onto his lap, and then climbed up beside it. "Read me a story."

Ted couldn't help but smile absently as he looked down at the book— the abridged version of _A Thousand and One Arabian Nights_. Andromeda had told him multiple times that there were better things to be reading to a five-year-old, but he resolutely stuck to the idea that if all the contact to the Muggle world Nym got was his taste in literature, then she might as well make the most of that. "Which one?" he asked.

"Sinbad," Nym answered without hesitation.

Ted grinned— his daughter really did have his taste in literature. "Which Sinbad?" he asked, toying with her blue hair. It probably hadn't been intentional— very little of what Nym chose to do with her unusual talent was intentional— but it had ended up silkier blue than it did when it was her natural thick chestnut one could rarely get a brush through.

"The one with the giant bird in it?" she asked.

"To Roc it is, then." Ted flipped through the book in search of the tale, but still couldn't help looking at Nym's blue hair. "So . . . why blue, anyway?" he asked.

"I like blue," the little girl answered, as if that explained everything in the world.

"You're mum'll try to make you change it back," Ted answered with a laugh. "We're meeting a couple of friends of hers for dinner."

Nymphadora shook her head. "I won't change it," she announced stubbornly.

Ted found the picture of Sinbad being carried by the giant bird and left the argument there. Andromeda could deal with it later, poor girl. For now, Nym's hair could be sapphire. He practically knew this story by heart, as it was Nym's favorite, and he left it open to the picture for her benefit as he told it.

Meanwhile, his mind wandered. Hopefully, he could get Nym down for a nap and at least clean the house before Meda came home from shopping— things had been insanely hard on her lately. What had struck most of the wizarding world as a blessing had been more of a curse for the Black family, after all, with one of her sisters and her cousin in Azkaban, her other cousin a Death Eater that had been killed, and her aunt had a complete breakdown over it a year ago she was only beginning to recover from.

Meda didn't like to talk about it, though— she'd severed most of her familial ties when she'd married him, and she claimed to never have regretted it. Sirius had hit her hard, though. Ted was still a little shaken up by it himself— he'd never thought the only Black to show up at his and Andromeda's wedding, the laughing little boy that had mock seriously taken the father's roll when he'd dated her, might have turned that much in so short a space of time. It was less than a month since Sirius had gone to prison, and he was still afraid to mention it to her.

With his mind on a completely different track, it was a moment before he realized that Nym was snoring halfway through his description of the Roc's giant egg. He picked her up and carried her into her room.

"What'd I do with the broom?" he mumbled as he looked around the living room. Whenever he did his wife the favor, Ted cleaned the house the old-fashioned way; he'd never gotten the knack of the spells. It was clear the Nym had gotten her ability to organize from him— there didn't seem to be any order to the things she'd tried to put up. Fortunately, however, Ted knew the house.

He had the living room in better order than it usually was after half an hour, at least,and he started washing the dishes. Amazing, the mess three people could make in a few days with two working parents and the usually organized one too busy just trying to get from one day to the next.

He heard the front door open, wiped his hands off, and went to see if Andromeda needed any help. She didn't protest when he took the bags from her and wandered into the living room while he took them to the kitchen. "All right, what did you two break?" Meda's voice drifted into the kitchen.

Ted laughed and appeared in the doorway, looking mildly at his wife, who stood looking around the room in pleasant surprise. "It's good to hear you joking again," he announced. "And I thought it was nice of me."

She shook her head, wandered over, and kissed him on the cheek. "Thanks, Ted," she whispered.

"You've been crying again, haven't you?" he whispered, brushing her black hair back from her face. It hadn't been raining, but it felt a little damp.

"It's nothing, really," she muttered, shaking her head and pushing his hand away again. "I ran into Remus at the Apothecary. . . ."

"How's ole Lupin been doing?" Ted asked, some concern in his voice. Sirius's betrayal, and James and Lily's death, had hit them hard, but it wasn't half as hard as it must've hit Remus. On top of that, last night had been the full moon . . . and Remus had admitted that he was a werewolf.

"He's alive, at least. You can ask him to tonight— I asked him to join us for dinner," Meda told him, shaking her head. "I'm fine."

"You met Cissa, too, didn't you?"

"Cissa shocked the life out of me, actually," Andromeda admitted, shrugging. Her voice sounded a little thick. "She asked my how Nym was doing and if I was getting along all right. I think she's in shock about Bellatrix— Lucius nearly went Azkaban, too, you know." As Ted started to open his mouth, she cut him off, "As much as you'd like Lucius to go, Ted, they've got a boy younger than Nym is."

Ted closed his mouth again. He didn't wish raising a child alone on his sister-in-law. "Sorry, Meda."

"About? You didn't say anything, and you had every right to say it, considering what Lucius is," Andromeda pointed out, her usual sensible self.

"Not about that," he answered, shrugging. "About everything. Thing's've been murder on your family lately, and whether I like them or not, I should've been beside you a whole lot more." _More than just after your aunt broke down and Sirius was arrested,_ he thought, but that he didn't say out loud.

"I knew I was going to have to keep some things separate when we said our vows," she answered, shaking her head. "I never asked you to put up with them for me."

"You never should have felt like you were giving them up for me," Ted answered.

"I didn't. Between Lucius and Bellatrix, I _wanted_ to give them up," Andromeda protested. "I maybe wish I hadn't now, but. . . . I can have a civil conversation with Cissa now, at least." She stepped past him into the kitchen and laughed, one of the first times he'd heard her laugh in over a week. "Theodore Tonks, are you a wizard or not?"

"I never _did_ quite master_ Scourgify_," Ted replied in an overly cheerful voice that just made Andromeda laugh a little harder. "And magic saves time, but it's still only a substitute for elbow grease." He leaned over and kissed her lightly. "I did do you a favor that took more than a wand wave."

She ruffled his hair, already tousled from neglecting to comb it. "And where was Nym when you did this?" she asked.

"She went down for a nap forty-five minutes ago."

"She's a few years past the age where she should be going down for one all that often, isn't she?" Meda asked knowingly. "And you need to get her up, or else she'll never get to bed tonight. Besides, if she's coming to dinner with us she needs to get ready."

Ted eyed the dishes. "I think that's a job for you. I couldn't even convince her to change her hair back to a natural color earlier this afternoon."

"Tell her that if she doesn't, she's not coming," Andromeda answered with a sigh. "I can't get Sirius . . ." She faded off and swallowed before continuing. "I can't get Sirius to babysit at the last minute anymore, but I don't think she knows that."

Ted nodded, his own throat a little tight. Nym had asked him at least once last week if Sirius was going to come over soon. "I'll get her."

Nymphadora actually put up very little protest at changing her shirt and her hair. In much less time than he had anticipated, the two of the were back in the kitchen, Nymphadora looking a lot like a miniature of her mother, with her natural grey eyes and long black hair instead of blue. Andromeda had just finished magically cleaning the kitchen.

"Are we ready?" she asked, glancing from her husband to her daughter.

"As we'll ever be," Ted answered, shaking his head. It had been Andromeda that had organized this, and she was obviously not about to be the last one there. That made him feel better. His wife, at least, seemed to be carrying on again.

**

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Author's Note:** Don't you love those little ideas that beat you over the head and shout "Write me!" at the top of their lungs? This is a one-shot, which explains why I gave in (though it took me three days to write with writer's block), and I'm still not sure how good it actually was. Care to tell what you think? Cheers! — Loki 


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